As the decidedly determined but utterly dishonest Democrats in the House of Representatives work feverishly today to pass the American Clean Energy and Security Act, better known as the Waxman-Markey bill — which, if it makes it through the Senate and is signed by Obama, will be the largest tax increase ever . . . as in EVER! — what these busy-beaver legislators won’t tell the American public is that their precious, so-called consensus on the science of Global Warming, or as they like to refer to it now, Climate Change, is falling apart faster than Humpty Dumpty hitting the ground at Mach 2! From Kim Strassel in today’s Wall Street Journal:

Among the many reasons President Barack Obama and the Democratic majority are so intent on quickly jamming a cap-and-trade system through Congress is because the global warming tide is again shifting. It turns out Al Gore and the United Nations (with an assist from the media), did a little too vociferous a job smearing anyone who disagreed with them as “deniers.” The backlash has brought the scientific debate roaring back to life in Australia, Europe, Japan and even, if less reported, the U.S.

Hmmmm, beat down informed dissent long enough and someone gets a bit irritated, irritated enough to actually do something about it — like come out and tell the world that the religion of anthropogenic climate change makes about as much sense as Scientology. Channel your inner “thetan” and save the planet? Dude! More from Strassel:

The number of skeptics, far from shrinking, is swelling. Oklahoma Sen. Jim Inhofe now counts more than 700 scientists who disagree with the U.N. — 13 times the number who authored the U.N.’s 2007 climate summary for policymakers. Joanne Simpson, the world’s first woman to receive a Ph.D. in meteorology, expressed relief upon her retirement last year that she was finally free to speak “frankly” of her nonbelief. Dr. Kiminori Itoh, a Japanese environmental physical chemist who contributed to a U.N. climate report, dubs man-made warming “the worst scientific scandal in history.” Norway’s Ivar Giaever, Nobel Prize winner for physics, decries it as the “new religion.” A group of 54 noted physicists, led by Princeton’s Will Happer, is demanding the American Physical Society revise its position that the science is settled. (Both Nature and Science magazines have refused to run the physicists’ open letter.)

The collapse of the “consensus” has been driven by reality. The inconvenient truth is that the earth’s temperatures have flat-lined since 2001, despite growing concentrations of C02. Peer-reviewed research has debunked doomsday scenarios about the polar ice caps, hurricanes, malaria, extinctions, rising oceans. A global financial crisis has politicians taking a harder look at the science that would require them to hamstring their economies to rein in carbon.

Regardless of all this, the Dems are hell-bent on passing this legislation. Hugh Hewitt writes today:

The Pelosi Democrats will try and push through the massive tax hike that is disguised as “cap and trade” today, and the 1200 plus page bill is constantly changing and of course has not been read much less understood by the Democrats voting for it. If this bill or anything remotely like it becomes law, the American economy will be pushed into a deep recession that will make the past six months look like the good old days.

Moderates and conservatives are wrong to expect that the Senate will simply kill the bill, though all efforts will have to be switched immediately to the upper chamber if the Pelosi/Waxman/Markey radicals bribe enough Dems with special provisions to pass it today. The so-called Blue Dog Democrats are proving to be worthless as a check on the hard left of their party, and only a huge course correction in November 2010 will keep the country safe from the radicals currently running the Democratic caucus in the House. No one who votes for this bill can claim to be a “moderate Democrat.“

Michelle Malkin’s syndicated column today exposes the Obama administration’s “willful and reckless disregard for data that undermine the illusion of [Climate Change] “consensus.”

The Obama administration doesn’t want to hear inconvenient truths about global warming. And they don’t want you to hear them, either. As Democrats rush on Friday to pass a $4 trillion-dollar, thousand-page “cap and trade” bill that no one has read, environmental bureaucrats are stifling voices that threaten their political agenda.

So, let’s see. We are in the worst economic downturn since the Great Depression with really no end in sight at the moment, 800-billion in stimulus notwithstanding. The rest of the Western world is coming to its senses and moving to the right politically. Well-respected scientists are jumping off the Global Warming locomotive as it races toward the cliff of financial disaster and what does our Democratic-controlled Congress do? Double down, that’s what. They want our money folks, all of it! How else can they possibly hope to pay for the next exciting chapter of this Summer of Obamination — single-payer, government-controlled health care?

After nationalizing the banks and then two of the Big-3 auto makers, now they want control of the energy companies and then the health care industry. Not much left after that. Kinda makes ol’ Benito Mussolini look like a piker, don’t it? Better hope the Blue Dog Dems have some balls, ’cause otherwise we’re all screwed! Reading Hewitt — we’re screwed!

[Update -- Okie Congresswoman issues her statement] Yipes! The house.gov server is down!!! (Fri. 6/26, 12:30 EST)

Fallin Statement on Proposed “Cap and Trade” Energy Legislation

WASHINGTON — Congresswoman Mary Fallin (OK-05) issued the following statement today regarding her opposition to “cap and trade” enery legislation:

“The so-called ‘cap and trade’ bill amounts to nothing more than a gigantic tax on energy consumption, to the tune of over 600 billion dollars. The economic consequences of this enormous new tax could be catastrophic. Entire industries – including manufacturing, energy and agriculture—will suffer. Families will face a sharp spike in energy costs. Jobs will be lost. The National Association of Manufacturers has estimated this one piece of legislation could destroy over one million jobs in the coming years. All of this comes at the worst time: in the middle of a recession, when our national unemployment rate is already well over 9%

“Moreover, this bill is particularly unfair to Oklahoma. Our state is a large producer of both oil and natural gas, and the restrictions this legislation places on the production and exploration of these resources will devastate our energy producers. That will not only destroy oil and gas related jobs, it will also lead to a reduction in tax revenue, which in turn will affect our ability to maintain and repair roads, bridges, schools and other public works and services.

“Worst of all, this poorly conceived legislation is entirely unnecessary. There are better, cheaper ways to reduce our addiction to foreign oil and to protect and preserve our environment. The United States has an abundance of energy resources. We have a large amount of oil and clean burning natural gas. We have enormous potential to expand our production of wind, solar, and nuclear power as well as biodiesel fuels. Rather than stifle production of the resources with a massive tax increase, we need to encourage the environmentally responsible development of all types of American energy. Doing so will create jobs, boost tax revenue, provide for our energy needs in the near term and ultimately lead to exciting breakthroughs in energy technology that will one day provide us with cheaper, cleaner sources of energy.”

The American Clean Energy and Security Act, better known as the Waxman-Markey bill, is being rushed through the house, with all the effort that Nanny Nancy Pelosi and ol’ Big Al Gore can muster.

Friday’s vote on the measure is expected to be close, but multiple sources on both sides of the aisle say they’re confident that the bill will pass — with some Republican votes — following a deal between House Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman Henry Waxman and Agriculture Committee Chairman Collin Peterson.

Despite the rosy scenario painted by the Dems and the heavily caveated CBO report, the Wall Street Journal is calling this bill the biggest potential tax increase evah!

The biggest doozy in the CBO analysis was its extraordinary decision to look only at the day-to-day costs of operating a trading program, rather than the wider consequences energy restriction would have on the economy. The CBO acknowledges this in a footnote: “The resource cost does not indicate the potential decrease in gross domestic product (GDP) that could result from the cap.”

The hit to GDP is the real threat in this bill. The whole point of cap and trade is to hike the price of electricity and gas so that Americans will use less. These higher prices will show up not just in electricity bills or at the gas station but in every manufactured good, from food to cars. Consumers will cut back on spending, which in turn will cut back on production, which results in fewer jobs created or higher unemployment. Some companies will instead move their operations overseas, with the same result.

When the Heritage Foundation did its analysis of Waxman-Markey, it broadly compared the economy with and without the carbon tax. Under this more comprehensive scenario, it found Waxman-Markey would cost the economy $161 billion in 2020, which is $1,870 for a family of four. As the bill’s restrictions kick in, that number rises to $6,800 for a family of four by 2035.

Even the collected wisdom of the Dem wits in Congress can buckle under the weight of reality, but only to a point.

“Yeah, yeah, we know the gun’s locked and loaded”, but they put it to our heads and pull the trigger anyway. Like the ol’ adage of the scorpion getting a ride across the pond on the back of the frog, stinging the frog to death dooming both to drown — they can’t help themselves, it’s their nature.

Even as Democrats have promised that this cap-and-trade legislation won’t pinch wallets, behind the scenes they’ve acknowledged the energy price tsunami that is coming. During the brief few days in which the bill was debated in the House Energy Committee, Republicans offered three amendments: one to suspend the program if gas hit $5 a gallon; one to suspend the program if electricity prices rose 10% over 2009; and one to suspend the program if unemployment rates hit 15%. Democrats defeated all of them.

The sad part is that they are getting any GOP support on this boondoggle of a tax, Tax TAX bill. Bend over and grit yo teeth suckers, cause it’s a comin’ and there ain’t gonna be any KY this time.

Better yet, if you live somewhere there’s a Blue Dog Democrat, call ‘em and tell ‘em that if they vote for this in 2010 they’re out — no ifs, ands or buts! Steppenwolf (John Kay, Jerry Edmonton, Nick St. Nicholas and Larry Byrom) wrote these next words as an anti-Vietnam-war screed, but they seem eerily appropriate in light of what’s going on in Washington today:

The spirit was freedom and justice
And it’s keepers seem generous and kind
It’s leaders were supposed to serve the country
But now they won’t pay it no mind
‘Cause the people grew fat and got lazy
And now their vote is a meaningless joke
They babble about law and order
But it’s all just an echo of what they’ve been told
Yeah, there’s a monster on the loose
It’s got our heads into a noose
And it just sits there watchin’

{…}

America where are you now?
Don’t you care about your sons and daughters?
Don’t you know we need you now
We can’t fight alone against the monster

It’s gettin’ less and less pretty out there folks. “America where are you now?” indeed.

Howdy! If anyone is still out there to read this . . . I see that it was Mother’s Day, 12 days ago since I posted. That has to be some kind of record for me. It’s certainly not that there hasn’t been a lot to write about, a lot to complain about, a hell of a lot to be worried about — but gee folks, clients came out of the woodwork with a vengeance and one would be a fool to complain about being busy in this current economy!

Speaking of said economy, I see on Drudge that the feces have hit the wind machine big time — the Fed Chairman “promising” that inflation will increase, all but six states had job losses last month with this lovely granola state ‘winning’ the biggest loser contest, the Feds may force GM into bankruptcy even though it has made a tentative ‘deal’ with the UAW, (funny how those pesky bondholders can be so picky about the terms of their haircuts — gee, ya think that a secured lender is supposed to get preference over the Unions’ unsecured debt or somethin’?) The US dollar has hit a new multi-month low vs euro, pound and yen. Sweet! Anymore good economic news?

Oh yeah, Treasury Sec. Tax-dodger Tim is ‘concerned’ about U.S. creditworthiness, which is being flushed down the toilet Internationally so he’s now ‘promising’ to cut the budget deficit, like right damn now! With all the spending this administration has planned, and the stimulus package and TARP plus the impending Carbon Cap & Trade legislation that is being railroaded through Congress without opposition comment — where are they gonna come up with the moolah? Once they drain that upper 5% income bracket, better bend over ’cause they’re gonna come after yours and mine!

One last item before I’m off for a client lunch. Nancy Pelosi is now finished saying anything more about her accusations of lying by the CIA. Guess that hole’s been dug deep enough!

More when I can . . .

I’ve been a bit under the weather the last few days or so but after reading this from a link on Drudge I just had to blog for a sec. Seems like our Senate has at least this one priority right, but the House, led by the nation’s grandma, Nancy Pelosi, just can’t seem to decide if it might be proper to show some support for out best ally in its time of great need. From Breitbart:

Members of the House left Washington on Friday for their two-week spring break without weighing in on the international crisis tormenting the nation’s closest ally: the capture of 15 British sailors and marines by Iran.

The omission by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., is being noted by some Republicans, who say they should have gotten the chance to join the Senate in denouncing Tehran’s bold actions.

“I am very disappointed that the speaker chose not to act,” said Rep. Charles Dent, R-Pa.

“I believe it’s important for us as Americans to show our solidarity with the Britons,” he added in a phone interview Friday. “The British are our closest allies, and I think we have to stand next to them in a moment like this.”

The Senate on Thursday, before adjourning for its one-week break, passed a resolution condemning the act “in the strongest possible terms” and calling for the sailors “immediate, safe and unconditional release.”

Pelosi’s spokesman Brendan Daly said the speaker was reluctant to weigh in on the incident without knowing that such a message would do more good than harm. Daly said the British government had not asked Congress to try to pressure Tehran.

“The leadership discussed it and agreed that inserting Congress into an international crisis while ongoing would not be helpful,” Daly said.

Pelosi is traveling in the Middle East, where she plans to visit Syria, Israel and the West Bank.

OK, let me see if I’ve got this one figured out. “[T]hat inserting Congress into an international crisis while ongoing would not be helpful[.]“ Hmmm. But Congress is willing to not only insert itself into the Iraq war effort in clear disregard to what is happening on the ground, but want to micro-manage it all and set a date for it to just be over. Wow! If that would work, maybe ol’ Nance should adjust her trip and stop over at Ahmadinejad’s pad and give him a time to set the Brits free. I know, that’s stupid.

But what is more stupid, and cowardly, is for her not to call the House in session and pass a resolution in support of our allies. Maybe she’s PO’d at Tony Blair for supporting the Iraq war effort and feels like they are getting what they deserve. I certainly wouldn’t put that thought past her.

Now, back to some recovery R&R . . .

Technorati Tags: Nancy Pelosi, 15 British sailors, Iran, Brendan Daly